These gas prices...

Some of you may know that we live very near a large and fabulous grocery store. Close enough to walk to when you have time and don't need much. If only they had bike racks, it would be convenient when you were in a hurry and didn't need much. I have asked twice that they install a bike rack, to no avail.

Tonight I rode over the store because we needed just a few things for dinner. Of course, still no bike rack, but I brought my lock anyway. I asked the security guard outside if they had one and he said, "no, they didn't." So I said, "Well, I guess I take up less room than one of the carts with the kiddie car in the front." He agreed and wished me a good day. So I walked my bike all through the store and picked up my 4 items and went to the self checkout, paid and walked out again, all with my bike. I got a few stares, but mostly smiles and jokes about gas prices.

Maybe they'll put in a bike rack soon.

The Sunshine State

Last weekend John went up to Charlotte to watch a race with his brother and I went down to Florida to visit my grandma in the Orlando area. To get there was mostly highway driving but the last 20 miles or so were on SR 46, which some people evidently confused as the speed limit. Sunday morning, I experienced the other side of the Sunday driver phenomenon. We drove around the lakes looking at the new houses at the screaming speed of 35 mph. Despite the line of traffic behind us, we had a great time looking at crazy Florida architecture and the house that Tiger Woods' father used to live in. On my way back home I saw the following license plate.

Pardon the blur. The picture was taken at extreme zoom while going 78 mph.

The hills are alive...

We just got back from a lovely weekend in the mountains of NC. We had gone up for the momentous occasion of John's brother's graduation from college. He had the misfortune of having his unusual middle name mispronounced and misannounced as "Martha". Aside from everyone calling him Martha for the next 2 days, he seemed to enjoy his newly acquired "graduate status".

We stayed at a cute little bed and breakfast in Sylva NC called the Freeze House. It was built in 1914 and our room had a nice view of the mountainside. We had an amazing thunderstorm for entertainment through our enormous window on Friday night. The proprietress was chatty and pleasant and she had really tasty apple butter for the biscuits at breakfast.

Saturday before the ceremony we went to Whitewater Falls with the family. The drive through the slalom course around Cashiers was worth it for the view at the Falls.Sunday, after helping load Raynor's truck to get him home, we added a few scenic hours to our trip home by taking the Blue Ridge Parkway and some back roads to get out of North Carolina. On our way we saw my favorite parkway sign.

It's a good thing I wasn't planning on doing any stunt motorcycle riding on a rainbow. Hmm. Definitely the best non verbal sign on the parkway. Another great sign is the following:

We decided to take a back road to eventually get to Interstate 26 and along the way we discovered Looking Glass Falls.

Just beautiful, until the 7 year olds you're with point out the jeebies inducing creepy crawlies next to you on the path.

Eww!

Headed back to the car, we saw a great bumper sticker.

Men at Work

He comes from a garage down under. Something something "vegemite sandwich". Ok, I give up on that song though it has been stuck in my head of late.

Last week was a productive week. Our garage got a cleaning (finally, yet also for the first time) and a fabulous new addition....a worktable! It is a nice working height and big enough for painting, or small woodworking. Also great when completely cleared off for larger projects. (36" tall, 26" deep by 8' long). John designed/built the whole thing in a couple hours with not much help from yours truly (I was painting bags).

Look, it's already covered in projects.
Soon to come: a pegboard on the wall and bike hooks.